


ribs

by bbyfruit



Category: SKAM (Norway)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Childhood Friends, Bipolar Disorder, M/M, even is 18 and isak is 16, which is canon age difference but u should know that going in if it makes u uncomfy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-15
Updated: 2018-10-15
Packaged: 2019-08-02 10:47:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,019
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16303718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bbyfruit/pseuds/bbyfruit
Summary: “I meant it,” Even says. He feels Isak’s lashes blink against his own. “I love you.”Isak lets out a long breath through his nose and it feels like a blessing. “I love you,” he echoes.





	ribs

Even is a god and Isak is holding him back.

And Even finds himself laughing because the whole situation is just so ridiculous, because Isak’s sixteen and he doesn’t believe in love, which is ridiculous because Even knows it exists. Even can feel it, like a heartbeat thudding through the air. Even can see it, like waves of red, and he can reach out and just barely touch it. It feels like Isak’s hair. 

“What the fuck, Even?” Isak laughs, a little nervous. Even blinks. His left hand is in Isak’s hair and his right hand is holding a can of beer and his feet are bare against cement and there’s wind. He blinks again. They’re on a rooftop.

Isak has his fingers wrapped around Even’s wrist, the one attached to the hand that’s tangled in his hair, and his eyes are flashing with what looks like fear. Even wiggles his toes, feeling the cold below them.

“Isak,” Even says, and the heartbeat around them calms enough that he can hear his own words, “listen. I love you.”

He means it in every sense of the word. Isak stares back at him.

“Okay…” Isak says slowly. “Ev, you’re scaring me.”

“No, no. Listen, Isak, listen.” Even grasps Isak’s hair even tighter because something tells him that Isak’s about to run away. “Do you hear it?”

“Hear what?” Isak asks, his breath hotter than the summer air around them.

Even laughs. “The love, Isak. The love of it all.”

He watches Isak’s heart break in front of him.

Later, it’s identified as his first full-fledged manic episode, and Even’s sitting in a therapist’s office and all he can think is  _ how could you do this to him?  _

And Isak knocks on his bedroom door until Even gives up and lets him in, and Isak walks into the room with tears in his eyes, looks at Even and says, “How could you do this to me?”

Even cries. Even’s eighteen years old and his life is falling apart and this is his best friend in the world in front of him, kneeling on his blue bedspread and crying and asking, “How could you shut me out?”

“It was,” Even whispers, “the hardest thing I’ve ever done.”

Isak curls into a ball on the bed. “I miss you. I miss us.”

And it’s been a long time since Even’s seen Isak this vulnerable, a long time since Even’s seen Isak this sad, so he mirrors his position and presses their foreheads together. 

“I meant it,” Even says. He feels Isak’s lashes blink against his own. “I love you.”

Isak lets out a long breath through his nose and it feels like a blessing. “I love you,” he echoes.

The two of them just stay there for the rest of the night, their foreheads pressed together and Even knows every spot on Isak’s skin, knows the curve of his eyelashes, knows the way his breath rises and falls when he falls asleep. Even  _ knows  _ Isak. But there’s this fear, one that lives in his ribcage, right behind his heart, that this changes everything. That Isak doesn’t know him at all. 

They grew up together. He watched Isak play soccer and cut off all his hair, watched Isak come running barefoot to his door when his mother lost her mind, watched Isak cry in his arms, watched Isak eat popcorn as Iron Man played on the laptop screen and watched Isak get high for the first time. Isak has been his best friend for as long as he can remember. And Isak’s good, and Isak’s the love of his life, and Isak’s the one he’s afraid of hurting.

He untangles his legs from Isak’s, carefully. He puts distance between them. And he falls into himself on the other side of the bed, back facing Isak, and he puts in earbuds so he can’t hear the way Isak’s lungs fill and empty, rhythmically, and he closes his eyes.

He sleeps.

When he wakes up, it’s to light streaming in through the edges of his curtains and Isak pressed against his back. Isak’s got his knees tucked under Even’s and his arm pulled tight around Even’s ribcage, warm, his fingers splayed over Even’s heart. Right where the fear lives. His lips are just barely brushing against the back of Even’s neck and Even holds his breath because he’s terrified of scaring Isak away. He’s terrified of breaking Isak’s heart again. 

“Even,” Isak whispers, tightening his hold. “Don’t leave.”

Even turns, slowly, rolling over until they’re pressed against each other, close enough that he can see the crust in the corner of Isak’s left eye. He wipes it away.

“You’re always leaving,” Isak mutters. He’s still half asleep and this is one of Even’s favorite versions of Isak, all honest and soft, no filters, no bravado, no barriers.

But now it’s Even’s heart breaking, his bones aching with shame. “I’m sorry,” he whispers back.

Isak shakes his head just the tiniest amount. “I understand. I’m easy to leave,” he says with the saddest smile that Even’s ever seen on him.

Even’s heart is leaking out through his fingers. He places his hand on the side of Isak’s face and traces the curve of his brow, the way it leads into his cheekbone, and he puts all his love behind his words. “You are,” he says, watching the way Isak’s eyes are drifting closed, “the best person I’ve ever known.”

Isak’s sixteen and he’s been through hell and back, all slamming doors and silence and tears, and Even has tried so hard to protect Isak from everyone else that he forgot to protect Isak from Even himself. 

Isak turns his face and Even’s hand runs over his lips. “Love you,” he murmurs, and Even feels it more than hears it, feels the way Isak’s breath hits the side of his thumb, feels the way that Isak’s words land solid in his chest.

Even moves impossibly closer, their bodies aligned, and wraps his arm around Isak, hand holding Isak’s head into his shoulder. He listens to Isak’s breathing and Isak’s asleep again. “I love you more than anything,” he tells the boy sleeping in his bed, in his arms, and he means just as much as he did when it was the mania speaking through him.

Isak smiles. “I know,” he whispers. 

“I thought you were asleep,” Even admits with his fingers dancing through Isak’s hair.

Isak opens his eyes then, green and blue and gray, and he takes a breath that Even can feel. “You don’t have to save me, you know,” Isak says.

“What do you mean?”

Isak shifts away, just enough that he can raise his head and look at Even, and he says, “I can take care of myself. You just have to let me in.”

“There’s a lot,” Even says. 

Isak reaches out and brushes a lock of hair out of Even’s eyes. “Too much for you to carry by yourself,” he points out. “Tell me.”

And Even does. Even tells Isak everything, the way the mania makes him feel like he’s outside himself, the way the depression makes him feel like he’s so far inside himself, all the fear that this is changing him, that he’s no longer himself, and Isak listens with his hand on Even’s heart. 

“I just feel like shit,” Even says. “Like a shitty person. Like I’m slowly taking the light from everything, from everyone, like I’m stealing people’s lives, yours and my mom’s, like I’m ruining everything. And I don’t see a future. I just see me trapped in this cycle, ups and downs and I’ll never be normal. It’ll never be okay. And there’s a part of me that thinks that everything would be better for you if I just left, if I just stopped hurting you, if I stopped scaring you and stopped breaking your heart. It would hurt less in the end. And you deserve so much, Isak. You deserve a life without pain and you deserve a life without me in it.”

It comes like a flood and then he’s crying and so is Isak.

Isak grabs his hand and holds it. “You are,” he says slowly, “the best thing in my life. And you can’t tell me what I deserve, because I deserve  _ you _ . I deserve  _ us _ . And I deserve to make my own decisions and I choose you, okay? I’ve been choosing you every day of my life and I want to keep choosing you and I  _ will  _ keep choosing you.” He tightens his hold on Even’s hand. “I’m here for it all,” he says. “I choose to be here for it all, do you hear me?”

And Even cries. He cries with light framing Isak from behind and sheets pulled up to their shoulders and Isak gripping his shirt like he’s never going to let go. He doesn’t.

They spend the morning in bed holding each other.

“Are you hungry?” Even whispers into Isak’s hair. 

Isak murmurs. His eyes are closed and his knees are tucked into Even.

“C’mon,” Even says, “my mom’ll make us pancakes.”

He sits up and grabs Isak’s hands, making a move to pull him up, but Isak pulls back just as hard and Even crashes into Isak’s chest. Isak wraps both arms around him and Even’s forgotten how strong Isak is, how much he’s changed from the scrawny kid with the skinned knees that Even’s known forever. 

“Let’s just stay here,” Isak says with his eyes still closed. “For the rest of our lives.”

And Even lays on Isak’s chest listening to his heartbeat. “Thank you,” he whispers.

Isak doesn’t answer, just tightens his arms around Even and exhales.

“No, I mean it,” Even says, sitting up and looking Isak in the eyes, “thank you.”

Isak moves his hands from Even’s back and tucks hair behind his ear. “You know I’m in love with you,” he says, and there’s something different about the way he says it, something honest and vulnerable and serious and grown up. And they tell each other they love each other but this is something deeper. This is Isak saying he’s  _ in  _ love, after seeing Even at his worst, after seeing Even manic and seeing Even cry and listening to Even bare his soul. And he doesn’t say it like a question, and something settles deep inside Even because he does know. He knows Isak’s in love with him. And there’s something about the moment, something about Isak’s hands on either side of his face, something about the way that Isak’s eyes are half closed.

Something about this.

“Can I kiss you?” Even finds himself asking, and Isak smiles, his eyes almost entirely closed now, and he nods, so Even does.

He kisses his best friend in the late morning light and mussed up sheets and tears dry on their cheeks and it feels like everything. 

It feels like coming home.

It’s Isak’s hands in his hair and Isak’s tongue in his mouth and Isak’s body against his, heat and love and everything right in the world.

They stumble out of Even’s room a good hour later, laughing and bumping their shoulders together, and Even’s mom isn’t home so he makes Isak eggs, scrambled with sour cream, and Isak sits on the counter and Even kisses him because he can. 

And then that’s them.

And so Even gets a diagnosis, bipolar I with psychotic features, and he gets bottles of pills and he gets some guy in a blue button-down patting him on the shoulder and saying, “Things get better from here, son.” And he gets Isak. And things aren’t perfect, but they’re good, and they get better, and he gets love and light and Isak chooses him every single day and he’s in awe.

“I love you,” Isak tells him, at a thousand different times in a hundred different places, and Even feels it in his chest every single time, replacing the fear behind his heart, and Even loves him back, more than he ever thought possible. 

And everything is love.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> boy howdy im really proud of this one so i hope yall like it ksdfkj
> 
> anyway as always find me on [tumblr](https://transmikael.tumblr.com/)


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